[Verse 1]
Ah, ah, when I was younger
I, I should’ve known better
And I can’t feel no remorse
And you don’t feel nothing back
I, I got a new girlfriend here
Feels like he’s on top
And I don’t feel no remorse
And you can’t see past my blindness

[Chorus]
Oh, Ophelia
You’ve been on my mind, girl, since the flood
Oh, Ophelia
Heaven help the fool who falls in love

[Verse 2]
I, I got a little paycheck
You got big plans and you gotta move (whoo!)
And I don’t feel nothing at all
And you can’t feel nothing small

[Pre-Chorus]
Honey, I love you
That’s all she wrote

[Chorus]
Oh, Ophelia
You’ve been on my mind, girl, like a drug
Oh, Ophelia
Heaven help the fool who falls in love
Oh, Ophelia
You’ve been on my mind, girl, since the flood
Oh, Ophelia
Heaven help the fool who falls in love
Oh, Ophelia
You’ve been on my mind, girl, like a drug
Oh, Ophelia
Heaven help the fool who falls in love

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12 user explanations and meanings

...

For some reason this song really hit home since the first listen. Maybe because it is so relatable to my current life situation. Here, Let me tell a story and see if I cant paint a picture with my my story summed up perfectly by the songs lyrics.

-When I Was Younger-

I think back to when I was just a kid. Heck, I still am, but still, I mean years ago. 10 to be exact, yeah 5th or 6th grade I think. Sitting on the bus, I saw this red backpack and long brown hair. It was right then and there, it was those crazy thoughts that have helped carry me along in life thus far.
-Should Have Known Better-

After that day the next 10 years of life with this person is FAR to much to even begin to explain. But even at a young age I knew something about this girl was different, way different than any human I have ever met before. The feeling almost of what one would imagine another persons “soul” feeling like, or like a ghost, but not in the creepy ghost way. 🙂 That feeling would later gain context in my life. Those “no emotions” in the chorus… just a flat out lie… for what the future really holds, especially in the context of those words.

The whole time, and I mean since like 2 years of knowing her (we are talking 8 years! Just 4 years less than HALF of my life) I had this “soulful” feeling that she felt those same feelings. Maybe not in the same way I did, maybe not to the extent that I did, but something about me, a feeling that she had about me, that was also unrelated in any other way she knew.

-The Flood-

Over the course of these years, our STRICLY friendship(… dead serious! So close, yet so far in the terms of “no emotions” friendship) we were best friends. We told each other everything, shared ever story, held back nothing. Or at least so I think to this day. Obviously the years had their down times. Fights, relationships, mismatched schedules. About 4 years into our “no emotion” friendship I found myself in another unfamiliar, situation, although the situation was unfamiliar, some of the emotions WERE familiar. As if I was entering another “emotionless” friendship. That friendship lasted 3 years, but was different in the manner that it had a title. Eventually those unfamiliar emotions gained this title so frequently tossed around in society LOVE.

3 years of friction, and fractured emotionless feelings with the best friend I had know. Silence struck all to often, at least a verbal silence. My emotions could never fully keep quite (still cant, probably never will) Those three years were a great learning experience and built great memories, but even then I still thought this other girl who maybe didn’t understand those “emotions had direct ties to what this “love” that I was in felt like” were maybe the emotions she felt for me… Just maybe…

-The Paycheck-

Eventually, in the course of the three years with the other girl I speak of, those emotions faded, and were no longer strong enough to stay tied to their moral based title.

After some time, we began to humidify the friction previously built. Our Friendship grew increasingly strong after that, still with its up and down over the matter of these now currently 2 years of being single. I even got 2 friendship “paychecks” like that little unexpected bonus that so rarely, and so commonly thought as not often enough 😉 comes along. These “bonus” clearly cross the line of a “normal” friendship. I think it is starting to be clear to both involved that those unknown feelings felt so long ago actually had far more context to them, that just needed time to unfold.

-Big Plans & You Gotta Move –

Just as these feelings start to hit even more unknown apexes with her, Life starts to take a hold. The real world steps in, She moves off to college, I Move off to my own ventures. I am feeling “NO EMOTIONS” … LOVE …LOVEEEE, I am feeling love more then I even knew I could. I guess distance really can grow a friendship sometimes. (yes, still friendship, that “paycheck” didn’t pay ALL of my bills, if you know what im sayin 😉

-You Cant Feel Nothing Small –

Although I am loving harder then ever, I feel as if she has now grown and even greater disregard to any titles or common structure. Almost like shes doing the opposite of what I thought I knew “love” as from my previous relationship. I begin to think and wonder if those emotions she had truly were exactly that. I even sometime wonder if I should have know better, considering I thought to think and hope she was feeling something that she never truly admitted to in a formal manner.

-Honey, I LOVE YOU, Thats All She Wrote-

Just as soon as I was/still am ready to give or, or at least imagine giving up on such a Mentally and memory created possible fantasy of a thought, there is that “honey I love you moment” those feelings and thoughts so emotionally expressed from her, yet still physically and verbally silent. They keep me holding on, They keep me seeing the world differently, They keep me Soulful, They keep me disguising the admittance of what our emotions really are, just as this song is doing (all she wrote, meaning she expressed it, but never actually SAYS it flat out).

To this very day I currently wonder if I should still know better. A far as I can hear, this song never truly does say how heaven helps a man who falls in love, especially if its a forever mystery if “heaven or the title LOVE in our “friendship” really does exist”.

...anyone

Anonymous

The band says this song is about dealing with sudden success / fame. So my guess is that these lines are about how people can feel down in the dumps and like a big loser that no one wants, then some kind of validation can change your outlook and give you hope…like being on top of the world, or the top of your game.

If you’ve been rejected a lot, then you finally succeed in finding a new relationship, it can make you feel like your luck has changed and you’ve “still got it”…

Just like a band who is struggling to make it, and finally does…they would probably feel like they’re on top.

Someone

Okay, so I came here wondering the same question… What does he mean by “I got a new girlfriend. Feels like he’s on top”. This makes no sense, unless he is gay… Somebody please explain this because its begining to disturb me now.

Dazed and confusex

Anonymous

I was wondering if this was about Ophelia as in Hamlets “girlfriend.” Because it talks about a flood- she commits suicide by drowning herself, and he says ” I have big paycheck” — he is the prince and alot of the play talks about him being to good for her. Im confused can someone please help me understand? Thanks

Nerd

I’ll betcha it is Hamlet!!! And this is his obsession with her after she dies. The said flood is her suicide, but is called a flood because he doesn’t believe her to take her own life, victimizing her, and creating her innocence. He is so in love that he refuses to think anything dark or evil could be in her.